Gone for Soldiers: Valley Forge Anniversary

It's now 240 years since my paternal great grandfather Abraham Heath (c. 1740-c. 1807) went into winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania) with the rest of George Washington's Continental Army.

[March to Valley Forge - William Trego, Philadelphia, 1883. This painting is now in the collection of The Museum of the American Revolution]

My ancestor's term of enlistment in the Virginia Line of the Continental Army ended in February so he didn't spend the entire winter in Valley Forge. You can read about his life after he went home here and learn the terms of his 1807 Warren County, Georgia, will here.

And here's a reminder of how I'm descended from Abraham Heath:

[Ancestry.com]

© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Gone for Soldiers: Abraham Heath (About 1740 - 1807), Soldier (Part VII)

Abraham Heath, a paternal fifth grandfather, must have been very happy to see the end of February 1778 because it marked the end of his two years enlistment in the Virginia Line of the Continental Army. There's no indication that he considered remaining with the army and had probably already left before Baron von Steuben began to drill the troops.

[A Winter Encampment is Valley Forge National Historical Park's official orientation film, currently shown daily in the park theater. It is an overview of the historical events that took place at Valley Forge during the 1777-1778 winter encampment in the American Revolution.]

You can read my earlier posts about Abraham Heath's military service here: Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, and Part VI.

Next time we'll look into Abraham's life after his military service.


© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Gone for Soldiers: Abraham Heath at Valley Forge

Two hundred and thirty-nine years ago this week (December 19, 1777) Abraham Heath (c.1740-c.1807),* a private in the Virginia line of the Continental Army, found himself in winter quarters** with the rest of Washington's Army in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.

[Valley Forge—Washington & Lafayette, 1856. Engraving, 7½ x 10½ inches (image). Henry Bryan Hall (1808–1884), after Alonzo Chappel (1828–1887). Martin, Johnson & Co., Publisher.

Photo Credit: David Bishop Skillman Library, Lafayette College, Easton, PA]

During my ancestor's time at Valley Forge his commanding officer was General George Weedon. In the map below you can see the location of the 6th Virginia Regiment's encampment.

["Encampment at Valley Forge 1778" by George W. Boynton (engraving) - Sparkes, Jered "The Life of George Washington" Boston: Tappen & Dennet 1843"The Cooper Collections of American History" (uploader's private collection)Scanned by the uploader, Centpacrr..

Licensed under PD-US via Wikipedia htps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Encampment_at_Valley_Forge_1778.jpg#/media/File:Encampment_at_Valley_Forge_1778.jpg]

Abraham's term of service was over in February of 1778 and as far as we know he went home to his wife and family (including my direct ancestor, his daughter Sallie Heath Chappell) as soon as he was mustered out.


*My paternal fifth great grandfather--I wrote a series of posts about what we know of his military experiences from the records in 2015: Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI
 .
**You can learn more about the huts built by the soldiers at Valley Forge here.



© 2016 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

2015: Looking Back

When I agreed to join my daughter's blog on October 1, 2014, I decided on two ground rules: we had to post every day and each post had to have a picture. (I'm a visual person.) Looking back over the past year I'm proud of what we've done here and in the process we've both learned a lot.

[Art and Picture Collection, The New York Public Library. "Best wishes for a happy New Year." The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1909. http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47e3-47d9-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99]

Two of the most exciting names added to my paternal family tree in 2015 are Cheney Boyce (1591?-1643?), Ancient Planter of Jamestown, and John Whitney (1592-1673), member of the Company of Merchant Tailors of London before his departure for Massachusetts in 1635. Christine's recent discovery that Olive Baldwin (1778-1843) was the mother of my maternal third great grandmother Mary (Polly) Gates (1805-1883) has opened up new lines of research that will be covered next year.

Another fascinating discovery was that my paternal fifth great grandfather Abraham Heath (1740?-1807?) served with the Virginia line of the Continental Army during the American Revolution and was one of the cold and hungry soldiers at Valley Forge. In case you missed it, you can read about what the records said here: Parts One, Two, Three, Four, Five, and Six. (Parts Three through Five were posted on the 168th anniversary of the events described.)

My two most popular posts in 2015 were Sunday Drive: Train Travel in Victorian England which looked at the ubiquity of mid-19th century British train lines, and Fantastic Find: Catholic Parish Registers at the National Library of Ireland which passed on the news that the National Library had just made their microfilm collection of parish records available online (and for free).

Another fantastic find, The McAdory House, was particularly useful in helping me understand the kind of dwelling my early Alabama ancestors probably lived in. (Spoiler alert: No white pillars or oak allies in sight.) And for those of you who also have ties to Alabama, let me recommend again Letters from Alabama, written by the Englishman Philip Henry Gosse about his experience there in 1838.

Christine and I have been having fun posting photos of Christmases we have known (or have pictures of) for the past ten days as a way of slacking off but still maintaining our goal of daily posts. With the new year we'll be getting back to genealogy.

Have a safe and happy New Year's Eve!

© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Gone for Soldiers: Abraham Heath (About 1740 - 1807), Soldier (Part VI)

After their defeat by the British at Germantown, Private Abraham Heath, along with the rest of Washington's Continental Army, marched off to spend the winter at Valley Forge. While he was there the Virginia troops were under the command of General George Weedon. Abraham's term of service was due to expire in February 1778 and I'm sure he was looking forward to his release.

[Valley Forge, 1777. Gen. Washington and Lafayette visiting the suffering part of the army / painted and drawn by A. Gibert 

lith and publ. by P. Haas, Wash. City. Haas, Philip, active 1837-1863, lithographer, about 1843.

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.]

["Encampment at Valley Forge 1778" by George W. Boynton (engraving) - Sparkes, Jered "The Life of George Washington" Boston: Tappen & Dennet 1843"The Cooper Collections of American History" (uploader's private collection)Scanned by the uploader, Centpacrr..

Licensed under PD-US via Wikipedia htps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Encampment_at_Valley_Forge_1778.jpg#/media/File:Encampment_at_Valley_Forge_1778.jpg]

We first learned about Abraham Heath's service through The Valley Forge Muster Roll* which led us to take a closer look at his records in the National Archive.

[The Muster Roll record for Abraham Heath]

Below is the Muster Roll of Captain Nathaniel Fox's Company for the month of December 1777 with Abraham listed fourth from the bottom of the right column.

[Regiment : 06th Regiment, 1776-1778 (Folders 165-177); 6th Regiment, 1778-1779 (Folders 178-180). Ancestry.com. U.S., Revolutionary War Rolls, 1775-1783 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2007. Original data: Revolutionary War Rolls, 1775-1783; (National Archives Microfilm Publication M246, 138 rolls); War Department Collection of Revolutionary War Records, Record Group 93; National Archives, Washington. D.C.]

You can read my earlier posts about Abraham Heath's military service here: Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V.

*Although we knew that he had been an active participant in the Revolution, we thought that he had served in the Virginia militia.


© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Gone for Soldiers: Abraham Heath (About 1740 - 1807), Soldier (Part I)

We've known since at least 2011 that my paternal fifth great grandfather Abraham Heath served as a private in the 6th Virginia Regiment during the American Revolution but until a few days ago we didn't realize what his service entailed.

However the research Christine and I did about his great great grandfather William Heath caused us to take a closer look at the intervening generations and she discovered that our ancestor served not in a local militia as we'd thought but in the Continental Army and spent several months at Valley Forge.

This amazing project is a volunteer effort by the Friends of Valley Forge Park and is offered to the public free of charge.

"The Valley Forge Muster Roll Project is dedicated to the memory of those who encamped at Valley Forge from December 19, 1777 to June 19, 1778. The original purpose of keeping muster rolls was to allow the Continental Army to track the army’s strength. The idea of putting information gathered from these 18th century muster rolls and making it available electronically was spearheaded in 1992 by Tom McNichol and the late Frank Resavy. They desired to create a list of the Continental soldiers who were at Valley Forge for at least one day. This core criterion remains applicable today."

Now that I know this about Abraham Heath, I'll be posting more about what we can learn about his service soon.



© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.